Janet Jacobson: In Memoriam

Janet Carol Jacobson, formerly of Scarsdale, passed away on January 23, 2014 at age 57 after a valiant fight with a rare form of cancer. She was born in Burlington, Vermont and raised in Scarsdale on Kensington Road and Brite Avenue in a family of five children. She was a College Scholar in the School of Arts and Sciences at Cornell University from which she graduated Phi Beta Kappa and then went on to earn her law degree at Columbia Law School, where she was a Harlan Stone Fiske Scholar. She began her career as an Assistant District Attorney in New York under Robert Morganthau and then moved on to the law firm of Frankfurt, Kurnit, Klein and Selz where she specialized in entertainment law. Ultimately she worked for Hallmark Entertainment structuring film financings and the production of films for television. Her work took her to Hungary and Berlin where she pioneered movie production deals.

Witty, bright, beautful and funny, Janet had the ability to get to the heart of an issue and see the irony in any situation. She moved fast and embraced life. An expert linguist she loved to travel, and used her Spanish, French, Italian and German to navigate her journeys. In New York, she was one of the first to move to DUMBO in Brooklyn where she enjoyed a panoramic view of lower Manhattan, the East River and the Brooklyn Bridge from her apartment. Janet was a voracious reader, an outspoken critic and observer of the political scene. She also enjoyed cooking and entertaining but above all loved to laugh.

She learned she had a rare form of cancer twelve years ago and through her research and determination outlived all the odds. Selecting her own course of treatment, she called the shots and became the master of her own destiny.

She is survived by her husband Jim Wildman, her father and stepmother Dr. Julius H. and Mrs. Jean Jacobson, her sisters Jeannie and Wendy and brother-in-law Andy Miller, her brother William, sister-in-law Beth, nieces Annalise and Sara, nephews Max and Jackson and James and Andrew Wildman and their families.

She was predeceased by her mother Beverly Jacobson in 2009 and her youngest brother David in 2003. She is mourned by her lifelong friends from Scarsdale including Margaret Cadoux, Joanne Marqusee, Mark Philips, and David Scheinberg, who all assisted her during her long fight against her disease, as well as Jennifer Conn, Bob Cadoux, Irving Gotbaum, Randy Hampton, Randy Ostrow, Sylvia Stein and Libby Rosenthal.

Janet's friends and family will gather Tuesday, February 4 from 3 to 8 pm at Frank E. Campbell Funeral Chapel, 1076 Madison Avenue at 81st Street, to remember her. A memorial service will be held in the spring.

Donations may be made to Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center; mskcc.org/giving/giftintro.html or to Dana-Farber Cancer Institute; https://www.dfci.org/give.

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